Leon Panetta: “I think the problem was that it was very difficult to try to find out exactly--when you say the Iraqi position, what…”

I recommend he take Reagan's position, which is trust, but verify.

And that is the danger here: that rather than bringing peace, it's going to bring more war.

Autocrats that once operated in their own spheres of influence have now joined together in an axis of mutual support and aggression.

It just -- it strikes me that what the chairman was trying to do perhaps was to try to send a wake-up call to both the Speaker and his Republican colleagues, that Russia still remains very much a threat to the United States.